Organizers of the city’s gay and lesbian pride parade, set for Sunday, are urging participants to follow city nudity and lewdness laws after receiving complaints that, in recent years, a few participants bared more than you’d see in a PG-13 movie.

And that means wearing underwear — if nothing else.

“We don’t want to push the envelope for the sake of making a point if it’s going to cost us the entire celebration,” said Michael Doughman, executive director of Dallas Tavern Guild, which organizes what’s officially called the Alan Ross Texas Freedom Parade.

The call for a modicum of modesty sparked controversy within the city’s lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual community. Some longtime participants aren’t happy. They say the parade, which is in its 30th year, should be the one day when LGBT folks can fully be themselves. Others say the expectation that revelers abide by the same laws as everyone else is exactly the type of equality they’ve been fighting for.

“There is a lot of dissension within the community about what’s appropriate and what’s not and who we are and who we aren’t,” said Cooper Smith Koch, an Oak Cliff resident who appeared in a controversial J.C. Penney Father’s Day ad with his partner and two children. “This is the natural evolution of any civil rights group. … There are divisions or factions within a group that start wanting different things.”

City ordinances have long prohibited intoxication, exposure of the genitals or anus and sex acts in public. Violators can face charges ranging from a misdemeanor to a third-degree felony, police said.

For years, Dallas’ pride parade — like those in other cities — modeled parade rules after state laws. Nothing has changed this year, Doughman said, except the organization decided to re-emphasize the rules after some sponsors, residents and LGBT families with children complained of inappropriate dress and behavior.

This isn’t the first time the Dallas Tavern Guild has had to issue such a reminder, Doughman said. But it hit a nerve for some in the LGBT community, whose path toward equality has sometimes pushed the boundaries of what’s acceptable. To some, it felt as if the Dallas Tavern Guild was stifling freedom of sexuality and expression — the core of the LGBT cause.

Daniel Cates, formerly with Get Equal, a group that fights for LGBT equality, wrote on a Facebook post that went viral: “The ‘queer’ is effectively being erased from our pride celebration in favor of the most polished, heteronormative representation of our community. … Our movement was built of sex positivity and our desire to BE WHO WE ARE!”

Others said it was the messenger — not the message — that caused the uproar.

Cd Kirven, regional director of Get Equal’s Texas region, said most in the LGBT community see this as part of a broader conversation about nudity and decency. But she said the message would have been better coming from the city or police, a body with power to enforce.

Dallas police said they are prepared to enforce the ordinances but won’t have to if everyone complies.

Doughman emphasized that there will still be ways to celebrate LGBT culture: drag or fetish attire, leather, Speedos, Western wear, even thongs if the strap is thick enough. As for exposed genitals or breasts and explicit gestures, Doughman said there’s a place for that — it’s just not a public street.

The expectation for Dallas’ pride parade seems to be much the same as for similar events around the country: freedom of expression, within the confines of the law.

In New York City, for example, “you can basically get away with a jock strap and that’s about it,” said David Studinski, march director for NYC Pride.

Koch, the father in the Penney ad, said Dallas’ parade is mostly “good clean fun” and no worse than anything that can be seen on MTV. He took his young children two years ago and said he doesn’t let the few people who cross the line ruin a celebration for his family.

But he supports the expectation that the LGBT community abide by the same laws as every other citizen. He called it “the ultimate show of equality for the gay rights movement.”

“If we’re wanting to be treated equally,” Koch said, “we have to be OK being treated with the same rules.”

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